Part 3: Gnomes
Our party regrouped from the madness as the chaos came to an end, all except Dorkel who was no more. The group had been dealt a great blow with the loss of their first companion, but had been interrupted from mourning by the very bear gnome that had contacted them earlier. Inquiring what had happened the gnome was shocked to see that the group had acquired a time watch, though it was missing its shielding component that would allow the users to withstand the effects of time during travel. The gnome and Ren engaged in a conversation before Ren had fallen unconscious and defecated himself. Meanwhile the three other heroes are approached by a gnome wielding a shank, demanding they would have the party's money, or their lives, though this was despite not having any money given they had just escaped jail. Grunthilda did the only responsible thing and curb stomped the gnome who dropped a frag grenade and a letter with the only word on it being "DORKEL". Out in the distance the group could see several red eyes glaring at them from the shadows, the Serbian pulling the pin of the grenade and throwing it into the shadows before a rain of blood showered the party. The beings in the shadows were yet more gnomes, all with a plot for revenge against Dorkel for some unknown crime, most of them carrying nothing but shanks, one of them dressed in a very fancy outfit and having a well written note on him detailing the atrocities that Dorkel had performed against their people. Choosing to ignore the threat of these gnomes, our party had now set off to an Armenian market in search for more supplies after magically being granted money from a random event. The party entered a store with a sign reading "Markus Munitions" before being greeted by an obese Greek man who referred to himself as Markus. After some persuasion by Grunhilda, Markus and the goliath began to passionately have relations behind the store counter. Markus had apparently been some sort of eldritch being that was capable of shooting some sort of acid out of his penis into the goliath's womb brutally injuring her just as the small kobold attempted to steal a pistol off one of the shelves. Markus simply laughed as he pulled out his gun and began shooting at the kobold, accidently missing and hitting an orphan outside of the building. The kobold reacted by summoning lightning using her magical powers but had somehow forgot that her friend was still next to the gun dealer, shocking the two of them for massive damage and killing her friend in the process. The battle raged on for several minutes before Markus was defeated and killed, all before the market guards had come charging in and arresting the Serbian and the kobold for the murder of Markus. Things somehow began to turn to black and rewind as time itself turned backwards, back to when the three entered the store, which at this point the group had bought items normally before leaving, not causing an issue this time. The group returned to Ren with new weapons and gear. The group saw that Ren was still passed out on the floor, now being poked in the eye by the gnome wielding a stick, before shrugging and asking the gnome to protect the human while they sought after the missing crystal to form the protective layer around the time watch. The group traveled to the small Serbian marketplace within the cave system before entering a bar and sitting down at one of the tables with a few brutal looking mercenaries, Arytom demanding information out of the bunch through a threat, which was met with an obviously hostile response of the entire bar pulling guns on the party. Grunhilda, who was now alive attempted to talk to the group in a threatening manner while various Serbs in the bar pulled down the hammer of their weapons in a method of intimidation, which urged Arytom to buy drinks for the bar in effort to defuse the situation. Accepting, the group of adventures as that, the Serbians disclose the information needed for the bunch to acquire the crystal needed to make the time cactus function fully. After being informed that their journey would be taking place in the lower most levels of Isphate caves, the group travel through the treacherous chasms to reach the gnome infested mines, the happy little fucks running around with their pickaxes and shitty cookies without a goddamn care in the world. Deciding to teach them a lesson for being gnomes, Grunthilda had pulled the pin on her legendary frag grenade and counted to three before throwing it into the gnome infested mine, two being too soon and four being out of the question. Within seconds there was a blinding light in the chamber, the gnomes in the center of the blast becoming nothing more than shadows on the floor. The ones further away from the blast were nowhere near as lucky. The party waded through the various charred gnome corpses to find the crystal, given they had never asked the other gnomes about the whereabouts of the crystal for sake of not associating with the gnome scum. Grunhilda in her infinite wisdom decided to attempt to summon a magical beast to help her in her situation but ended up summoning a pack of rabid squirrels that attacked the party. After a lengthy and brutal fight with the squirrels, Grunthilda decided to summon another magical beast, but yet again summoned more rabid squirrels. The mines now adorn with squirrel and gnome corpses was kind enough to yield a single patch of catabolic ardenmite crystals, the exact crystals that the group needed, though at a significant height in the cave. The group attempted to climb the cave walls with little success before Grunthilda simply extended her arms and closed her eyes, an amassment of squirrels forming under her feet as they created a tower to bring her to the crystal, the formation of three thousand squirrels somehow finding their way into this cave. Their quest for the crystal had come to an end, each of the bunch holding their head high with a smile for the ages, Grunthilda deciding that it would be most beneficial to once again summon an animal companion. With a flick of her ass and a whole lot of magic, the massive goliath managed to summon a creature, a familiar one, a fat one. It was none other than Margret, the legendary fat horse! The massive mare stood as she sipped from her cup of coffee, just hanging out before being questioned on the method of refining the crystal, the mare just telling the group to go to an average gunsmith before the mare was asked to join the party by Arytom, the mare just shrugging and coming along for the ride. Now reconvening with their friend Ren, the group of four had noticed that the situation with Ren had spiraled out of control, a sacrificial alter being built upon Ren's unconscious body, the alter decorated with the organs, entrails, and feces of several dozen dead gnomes. Bear gnome informed the group that after Ren's eye had absorbed the stick gnomes had traveled from near and far to start worshiping the unconscious human. Each gnome came bearing gifts, and like the full-blown retards they are, began to start a cult around Ren, immediately turning to human sacrifice after less than five minutes. After curb-stomping the cult leader and shooing the rest of the tards away with a broom, the bunch inquired with bear gnome about how to refine the time crystal and were met with the same response that Margret had given them minutes earlier. The group set off on their quest to get the crystal refined.